(1) Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a shock-absorbing package structure, and more particularly to the package structure with an adjustable inner space so as to accommodate components with different dimensions.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
It is an important event for electronic products to be properly packaged to avoid collision or damage during shipment. To achieve this purpose, a shock-absorbing package material is usually used encircling the electronic products for providing sufficient protection so as to prevent the electronic products from functional and appearance damages.
The most widely used shock-absorbing package materials nowadays are polystyrene (EPS), expanded polythene (EPE), and paper. EPE is made from foamed polythene (PE) and has isolated bubble structures to present the advantages of lightweight, flexibility, shock-absorbing ability, and so on. In contrast with EPS, which is made from foamed polystyrene (PS), EPE has a better flexibility allowing bending to any specific angle without breakup. In contrast with paper material, which needs a specific structural design for provide shock-absorbing event, EPE has excellent shock-absorbing ability itself. That is, an EPE package needs a lower fabrication cost compared with a paper package. In addition, due to the characteristics of PE, EPE also present the advantages of chemical damage resistant, heat-resistant, water-proof, and dust-proof.
EPE material can be properly shaped by injection molding according to the shape of the components to be packed. In addition, the injection molded EPE plates can be further shaped by cutting and adhered to form a three-dimensional shock-absorbing package structure.
FIG. 1 shows a perspective view of a typical EPE shock-absorbing package structure 100. The shock-absorbing package structure 100 is formed of two pieces of boards 120 and 140 adhered to each other. The inner board 120 is provided with a space 122 used to accommodate the component to be packed. The outer board 140 faces to a side surface of the component (not shown) for shock-absorbing event. Referring to FIG. 2, a pair of package structures 100 shown in FIG. 1 are assembled to the left side and right side of the component 200 to be packed relatively. In addition, also referring to FIG. 1, by assembling the component to the inner space 122 of the inner board 120, a proper buffer space around the upper, lower, front and rear surfaces of the component is provided to prevent the collision and damage from all directions.
It is noted that the shock-absorbing package structure must tightly enclose the packed component otherwise the packed component cannot be effectively protected. As a result, in order to match a variety of components with different dimensions, various shock-absorbing package structures with different dimensions are also required. However, the fabrication of the shock-absorbing package structures with different dimensions needs a variety of molding structure, which leads to a tremendous investment.
Furthermore, the mentioned shock-absorbing boards must have enough thickness to provide sufficient buffer distance. In addition, as shown in FIG. 1, the traditional shock-absorbing package structure requires a plurality of pieces of boards to provide proper shock-absorbing protection. Thus, a large amount of storing space is demanded for such shock-absorbing package structures due to the above mentioned factors.
Accordingly, as the types of shapes of electronic components continuously increasing, how to reduce the sorts of the shock-absorbing package structures to decrease the cost of molding apparatus and the storage space has become a major consideration for packaging industry.